Book Review & Discernment- "7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess" by Jen Hatmaker, part 2

Reblogged from Elizabeth Prata the-end-time.blogspot.com

In Part 1 of this two-part book review of Jen Hatmaker's "7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess", I wrote that the book's focus on social Gospel and try-harder, works mentality was really just Catholic Mysticism wrapped up in a new age monasticism. That the sweep of these kinds of books began a few years ago with David Platt's "Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream," continued with Year of Living Biblically by AJ Jacobs and A Year of Biblical Womanhood by Rachel Held Evans. Radical began a craze of anti-consumerism as a spiritual means to 'get closer to God' rather than a focus on the discipline of Godly living and biblical shepherding of our means - whatever means we've been given - via biblical standards.

Hatmaker's book states that she and her family "made seven simple choices to fight back against the modern-day diseases of greed, materialism, and overindulgence." All of this is completely off-kilter, of course, because we are supposed to be doing that anyway, while living completely for Jesus as His witness in sharing the Good News about the real problem modern-day folks have: sin. The worst part of the book I'd mentioned in Part 1 was that the by-product of the Hatmaker's legalistic and artificial methods of addressing their self-identified problem was that it meant they discovered "a greatly increased God." If you really think about that statement, it means that they are teaching that because they recycled, God increased.

However, a more ominous clue as to the incorrect emphasis Hatmaker's book is that she and her family participated in the "seven sacred pauses."

The "seven sacred pauses" are code for the Divine Hours. Divine Hours, AKA Liturgical Hours, AKA breviary, are praying at set times, like the monks used to do. It is Catholic mysticism at its most ancient and its worst.

The Liturgy of the Hours or Divine Office or canonical hours, often referred to as the Breviary, is the official set of daily prayers prescribed by the Catholic Church to be recited by clergy, religious institutes, and laity. It consists primarily of psalms supplemented by hymns and readings. Together with the Mass, it constitutes the official public prayer life of the Church. The Liturgy of the Hours, along with the Eucharist, has formed part of the Church's public worship from the earliest times." (Source wikipedia)

The Catholic's prayers at set times is very similar to the Muslim's 5X daily prayers. In Islam the prayers prayed at set times per day is called the Salah. As this Muslim website explains, "The prayer times are before daybreak, at noon, mid- afternoon, after sundown and at night. We wake up thinking of Allah and we interrupt our daily busyness to worship and remember him."

Below, a comparison of the Seven Sacred Pauses Hatmaker performed in her book and the false Catholic regime's unbiblical Divine Hours. Click to enlarge.

Just as the Catholic rituals of contemplative prayer and labyrinth walking are unbiblical, so is ritualistic, set prayer. Matthew 6:5-8 specifically advises against prayer becoming ritualistic. Matthew 6:9-15 teaches us how to pray according to the way Jesus would have us do. It should be noted that when Jesus taught the disciples (and by extension, us) to pray, He did not say when to pray, He only said "When you pray..." Bible.org, in teaching about the Lord's Prayer, says,

"It is not and was never intended to be a ritual prayer to be formally and liturgically recited. It was a model designed by our Lord to show the nature of prayer and what prayer should consist of by way of content. There is nothing wrong, of course, with reading or reciting it together as we would any passage of Scripture for a certain focus or emphasis or as a reminder of truth. I am convinced, however, it was never meant to be simply recited as a prayer to God in place of personal prayer poured out to God from the heart."

Personal prayer is never meant to be replaced by a man-made schedule with man-made meanings. It easily becomes ritualistic and that is something the Lord spoke specifically against in condemning the Pharisee's prayer and lauding the tax-collector's. (Luke 18:13). However, we all like to feel that we are more deeply connected to God, so prayer labyrinths are re-emerging as a popular activity in emergent churches. So are Spiritual formation disciplines. However labyrinths and other ritualistic prayer practices are not biblical. Got Questions says,

"While prayer labyrinths have been used in Catholic cathedrals for centuries, the past decade has seen resurgence in their popularity, especially within the Emergent Church and among New Age groups and neo-pagans."

So where did all this come from? Back along, conservative Christians discovered Dallas Willard, who was fascinated with the Catholic mystics. His rediscovery sparked an interest in the "spiritual formation disciplines," a series of ritualistic actions designed to form us into higher spiritual beings if performed correctly. In Matthew 11:29-30, Jesus mentions his yoke being easy, a yoke Willard interprets as the practice of spiritual disciplines like solitude, silence, and simple living. You can easily see the rearing-up of Catholic mystical practices based on those monastic notions, in conservative circles in the solitude (ritualistic contemplative prayer) and the current push from people like Hatmaker for "simple living" (monasticism).

Critical Issues Commentary says Dallas Willard re-interpreted the Christian life. Willard wrote, "Although we call the disciplines “spiritual”—and although they must never be undertaken apart from a constant, inward interaction with God and his gracious Kingdom—they never fail to require specific acts and dispositions of our body as we engage in them. We are finite and limited to our bodies. So the disciplines cannot be carried out except as our body and its parts are surrendered in precise ways and definite actions to God..." Wirse, CIC says that Willard sees Jesus’ “yoke” as an offer to take up a life-style that will make us better people. This is tantamount to substituting works for grace, and making Jesus an ethical teacher whose example can be followed rather than the unique Son of God who alone always does the things that please the Father." (source)

Neo-pagans are finding that some of those "specific actions" Willard promoted require dispensing with 'stuff' and stripping down to simple living, eschewing wealth as others define it, and living more at one with the world. Yet just as Jesus rebuked ritualistic prayers of the Pharisees, Paul rebuked man made ascetic disciplines designed to abuse the body (Colossians 2:20-23).

You can read more in the Critical Issues Commentary on the spiritual disciplines, here.

So why do women eat this stuff up? I don't know. I imagine the language used by such authors appeals to women, language like this-

"You can learn to enter into the spirit of the hour wherever you are. No matter what you are doing, you can pause to touch the grace of the hour."

Really? What does the grace of the hour feel like? How do I enter the spirit of the hour? Will it feel warm? Cold? Is there a door? Hours have a spirit? Who says?

Women like to feel they are warm, enveloped in love, watched over, and thus the romanticization of Jesus began. Jumping on to that notion, books like One Thousand Gifts, The Secret, and this book by Jen Hatmaker pierce the ancient desire of women for a gentle but strong white knight to speak to them in women-language, whispers that only they can covet and take in like perfume. Having an appearance of godliness only makes the book more enticing. Yet underlying the sensitivity of the language of these best selling books, the money side of things is the cold hard reality.

As female buying power increased, false prophets took note. Remember, the motivation for false prophets is money. (Titus 1:10-11 2Peter 2:1-32, Peter 2:14-151, Timothy 6:3-5)

This copy writing tutorial web page says that "Women’s buying power has increased tremendously in recent years. Mothers alone account for $1.3 trillion of sales per year. Romance fiction made $1.37 billion in sales in 2008 and, in fact, had the largest share of the book market (13.5 percent)." That figure is even higher now.

The same copy writing web page advises that if you want your books to sell there are ten key words to use: love, heart, secret, King, Queen, Princess, Prince (or some other honorable title), Temptation and Forbidden, Cloud, Moon, Stars (and other celestial bodies), heaven, paradise, kiss, Magic, Enchanted, Bewitched (and other references to the supernatural), and virgin.

We especially see this trend of romantic words in contemporary lyrics. It is a problem that women are succumbing to these ploys. 2 Timothy 3:6 says that a favorite ploy of satan is to capture weak willed women burdened with sins who then in turn influence the men.

MacArthur explains the 2 Timothy 3:6 women verse,

"The false cults and isms of today are no different than this, they go after weak defenseless women. That's their target audience. Why do you think they go door to door all day long and not at night? Who do you think they're after? Weak women who are vulnerable because they're out from some protection and who are captivated by these people because they promise them deliverance from the burden of sin and guilt and they promise them a system of truth. Those are the kinds of victims they pick on. They come from all kinds of angles. They come at them on the radio during the day. They come at them on the television. They come at them through the printed page. They come at them door to door. The word "weak women" is one word, it's used in contempt here, feeble women, easy prey, literally means little women. But it's the idea that they're just defenseless. Just as Satan's strategy was to deceive Eve, so heretical false teachers have frequently chosen to spread their falsehoods by the same method." [emphasis mine]
"And then in verse 7 it says they probably are the kind of women who have a curiosity about religion. They're attracted to easy solutions that don't really call for a radical change and don't deal with the real issue, the issue of sin before a holy God and salvation in Jesus Christ." 

So you find an attraction by women to a book that advocates turning off the TV and recycling as means for closeness to God rather than repenting and taking up one's cross daily. The former is easier, the latter is harder.

I'm not saying that every woman who loved Hatmaker's book, or The Secret, or Jesus Calling, One Thousand Gifts, or Seven Sacred Pauses are weak-willed. But rather, these books are the ploy of satan that match the verse in 2 Timothy where he will come after the women. And this is one way- slyly romance them. Thanks to Beth Moore and her spiritual daughters, we have a plethora of books and devotionals that use the exact methods we were warned about to get at the women, just as satan did in the Garden with Eve.

"For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths." (2 Tim 4:2-4)

"7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess" is not recommended.

As a final PS, I put the call out to men: in general, today's female Christian book market is a mine field of falsity and sly enticement. Most of it is bad. Only a little is good. Just in this one blog entry I noted the dangers of the following best selling books--

--One Thousand Gifts ( #14 in Amazon.com Christian Living Books)
--Jesus Calling ( #4 Amazon.com Christian Living Books)
--The Secret ( #16 Amazon.com Books > Religion & Spirituality )
--7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess (released 4 months ago,  #24 in Books > Christian Books & Bibles > Theology) THEOLOGY???!!!
--A Year of biblical Womanhood (#18 in Religious Studies > Theology)
--Beth Moore (The sales of her book about Esther alone were credited as part of what made a "strong" quarter for Lifeway Christian Stores during the height of the Great Recession- source)

These women make a lot of money for their publishers and women are buying their stuff in droves. Men, I'd recommend monitoring your wife or daughter or girlfriend's book consumption vigilantly.

Part 1 of Book Review, 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess

Book Review & Discernment- "7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess" by Jen Hatmaker, part 1

Reblogged from Elizabeth Prata the-end-time.blogspot.com

Part 2 here

The Shack got women talking. The Secret titillated them. A Thousand Gifts made them swoon. Now, 7:An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess by Jen Hatmaker is causing another stir among the female brethren. Here is the Amazon.com book blurb-

American life can be excessive, to say the least. That’s what Jen Hatmaker had to admit after taking in hurricane victims who commented on the extravagance of her family’s upper middle class home. She once considered herself unmotivated by the lure of prosperity, but upon being called “rich” by an undeniably poor child, evidence to the contrary mounted, and a social experiment turned spiritual was born."
"7 is the true story of how Jen (along with her husband and her children to varying degrees) took seven months, identified seven areas of excess, and made seven simple choices to fight back against the modern-day diseases of greed, materialism, and overindulgence."
"Food. Clothes. Spending. Media. Possessions. Waste. Stress. They would spend thirty days on each topic, boiling it down to the number seven. Only eat seven foods, wear seven articles of clothing, and spend money in seven places. Eliminate use of seven media types, give away seven things each day for one month, adopt seven green habits, and observe “seven sacred pauses.” So, what’s the payoff from living a deeply reduced life? It’s the discovery of a greatly increased God—a call toward Christ-like simplicity and generosity that transcends social experiment to become a radically better existence."

Where do I begin.

OK, as always begin with the language that is being presented and carefully scrutinize it, and then compare it to the bible.

First, the impetus of the book worrisome. A kid called them 'rich' so they changed their life? Were they ashamed to be called rich by a poor child? Guilty of the blessings God had sent them? If they were prosperous in contrast to a poor kid, then it was an opportunity to do more with their means. It is not a sin to be rich, even by comparison to others. Abraham was wealthy. So was Job. David. Solomon. Nicodemus. Joseph of Arithamea. Joanna the wife of Chuza, the manager of Herod's household, and Susanna; helped Jesus out of their own means. (Luke 8:3). It is the love of money that rots. Was this family loving money too much? Or just ashamed of what they had? There is a difference.

If they were attempting to shepherd their means in more Godly fashion, then that is fine. But it seemed that they were ashamed of their status in life. The bible has much to say about money, Godly living, shepherding resources, and excess, yet they did not consult with the word. They are off to a bad start.

What was their source for proceeding? They created a man-made outline to guide their behavior rather than consult the bible. By what standards did they decide on seven? On food, clothing, spending? What about giving?

Stress? Stress is part of life. Ask Paul. Peter. Stephen. Any martyr. Any Christian. We are at war with the powers and principalities of this world, and that is stressful. Do they think they deserve a stress-free life? What was the source of their stress? If they had made unGodly decisions about work, to the expense of their children, that is one matter. If they simply want the 'good life' that is another. Achieving it by man-made means and monastic 'simplicity' is not the way.

We have had a wave of these try harder "faith" type books these last couple of years. We suffered through Year of Living Biblically by AJ Jacobs and A Year of Biblical Womanhood Rachel Held Evans. In my opinion, this current wave of 'do something, try harder, strip away the consumerism so we can get close to God' kind of books began with David Platt's "Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream." That was a book that made it seem like those who were not doing big and bold things for God and coming home after work to sit on their American couch were second rate.

This past January, I wrote,

"You might remember I talked about the time when David Platt's book Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream came out. Christians all over the place got on the bandwagon and decided that their plain-jane faith was unremarkable and they needed an adrenaline shot of daring and a radical change to prove to God that they're really a Christian who means it. Let's contrast the fancy lights and high volume indoctrination of charismatic faith preached at Passion 2013 with this-" and I linked to John MacArthur's essay called "An Unremarkable Faith".

MacArthur's essay extolled the virtues of a plain old Godly life lived by biblical standards (which is actually harder to do than sell everything and run off to Burma.). And I mentioned Radical again this past March, referencing Southern View Chapel's treatment of Platt's book in fall of 2011. They write,

"A similar voice is David Platt’s and his book Radical: [Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream]. Platt offers better balance than Chan but still propagates a two-tiered gospel composed of the true gospel of redemption and the social gospel. While Platt is careful to elevate the true gospel, the social gospel of feeding the hungry and giving to the poor is the primary focus of the book and accounts for its popularity.[26] He writes, “As we meet needs on earth, we are proclaiming a gospel that transforms lives for eternity.”[27] The author does not advocate the social agenda as opposed to true evangelism, as mentioned above, but he does say that caring for the poor is evidence of salvation. As a matter of fact “rich people who neglect the poor are not the people of God.”[28] However, when we turn to the New Testament, we find that, while Christians are to be loving and generous to all people, they are never told to attempt to remedy the consequences of the sin of unbelieving humanity through social action."

7:An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess is a natural outgrowth of books like Platt's Radical. We can see influences of Platt in the blurb when we read that following the author's example will lead to "a radically better existence."

Are we to seek a radically better existence for ourselves on this earth? It is not our home. It is our battleground. Are we to seek a radically better existence for others on this earth through experiments like social gospel? No. Better their book be titled "An Experimental Mutiny Against Sin" because that is what Christians are called to do, witness for Christ against sin and Him alone as the way to overcome it.

I sidetracked about the Jacobs, Evans, and Platt books because I wanted you to see how these things are connected in waves. Platt's book was seminal and damaging. We see that now.

Back to An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess. The blurb says the family discovered that once they dispensed with their stuff, they found "a greatly increased God"? So, God 'increases' if we recycle? People, God doesn't change depending on what WE do.

The phrase in the blurb says it all: "a social experiment turned spiritual was born". They didn't consult the bible and adopt biblical standards in repentance and to seek God, they performed legalistic and rigid actions and a byproduct of that was that their own experience seemed to bring them closer to God. It's backwards. That is how one knows they are false.

Now, let's see what the bible has to say about riches.

Let's substitute Abraham's name for their name and see if this social experiment makes as much sense. From the blurb:

American life can be excessive, to say the least. That’s what Jen Hatmaker had to admit after taking in hurricane victims who commented on the extravagance of her family’s upper middle class home. She once considered herself unmotivated by the lure of prosperity, but upon being called “rich” by an undeniably poor child, evidence to the contrary mounted, and a social experiment turned spiritual was born.

From the bible-

Now Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold. And he journeyed on from the

A painting of Abraham's departure by József Molnár

Negeb as far as Bethel to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai, to the place where he had made an altar at the first. And there Abram called upon the name of the Lord. (Gen 13:2-4).

Blending the two-

"And Abram was called "rich" by a poor slave from Pharaoh's house and Abram felt guilty for his excesses. And lo, Abram chose the number seven and gave 7 cows to the child, and 7 pieces of silver to the beggar by the gate and 7 pieces of gold to the cripple by the road. And a grand social experiment was born, and behold, Abram felt closer to God and God was increased because of Abram's works."

BAH HA HA HA -- stupid, eh?

Now, it is not stupid to shepherd your means wisely. It is not stupid to care for the poor. It is not stupid to have compassion on those less fortunate. All those things are good. We are reminded of the Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:14-30). Some people are richer than others and that is the way God set it up (Matthew 25:15). It is what we do with what we have that He is looking for. (Matthew 24:28). How we go about witnessing for Jesus regarding those important topics is what matters. How we share our means is what is at stake. Is what we are doing for the right reasons and done in the right way? Because there are right and wrong reasons and a right and a wrong way, as the parable shows.

In the next part of this book review, I'll explore what the reference in the book's "seven sacred pauses" means. The meat of the problem with the book "7: An experimental Mutiny Against Excess" is contained in that phrase, and I'll explicitly tell you why this 'discipline' is very, very bad. Is what we are doing for the cause of Christ Godly and deep, grounded in His word? Or is what we are doing for the cause of Christ superficial and wrong headed, off track and thus of the kingdom of darkness? This book is in the latter group and in the next part I'll clearly show you how they went about it in the wrong way, and thus why the book is to be avoided.

Part 2 here

Amos Speaks Again - Jack Kelley

This Week’s Feature Article by Jack Kelley

Tucked away among over 8,000 posts currently available on the website is a series of articles in a category called “The Prophets Speak Again”. This category contains commentaries on the so-called minor prophets. (The major prophets are Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel. The minor prophets are Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. They’re not called minor because they’re less important, but because their books are shorter.)


I’ve tried to relate the writings of these prophets to our times and that’s why the category is called “The Prophets Speak Again”. So far I’ve posted commentaries on Joel, Zephaniah, Haggai, and Habakkuk. You can access these commentaries by  scrolling down the “Categories” list on the right hand side of any page until you reach “The Prophets Speak Again”. It’s the second from the bottom. Click on it to access a directory of all the commentaries in the category. Select the one you want and start reading.
I say all this to announce the beginning of a series on the book of Amos, which will become part of this category. Let’s begin with a little background.

Introducing Amos

Although Amos lived in a small town just south of Bethlehem and about eleven miles from Jerusalem, the Lord called him to be a prophet to the Northern Kingdom. His term of office, so to speak, lasted from 760 to 750 BC. This made him a contemporary of Isaiah, Hosea, Micah, and probably Jonah.

The division of Israel into two kingdoms had taken place nearly two hundred years earlier, but both the north and south were enjoying great prosperity. In the Northern Kingdom, it was a time of idolatry, luxurious living, personal extravagance, and immorality. The justice system had become corrupt and the poor were being oppressed. Having abandoned their commitment to God’s law, the people no longer had any basis for standards of conduct.

As their prosperity increased, the ruling class had become politically secure and spiritually smug, thinking it was a sign of God’s favor. They had ignored His warnings and His patience was at an end. He was sending Amos to announce that the coming judgment wouldn’t just be another warning. This time it would bring the end of the kingdom.
This similarity with our times is why I believe the message Amos brought to the Northern Kingdom will have relevance to America, and indeed the whole world, today. Let’s begin.

Amos 1 The words of Amos, one of the shepherds of Tekoa—what he saw concerning Israel two years before the earthquake, when Uzziah was king of Judah and Jeroboam son of Jehoash was king of Israel.
He said:
“The Lord roars from Zion and thunders from Jerusalem; the pastures of the shepherds dry up, and the top of Carmel withers.” (Amos 1:1-2)

Amos worked as a shepherd in his home town of Tekoa and saw a vision of the coming judgment. From the driest part of the land to the greenest, the Lord’s judgment would be as severe as if a drought had afflicted them.

Judgment on Israel’s Neighbors

This is what the Lord says:
“For three sins of Damascus, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath. Because she threshed Gilead with sledges having iron teeth, I will send fire upon the house of Hazael that will consume the fortresses of Ben-Hadad. I will break down the gate of Damascus; I will destroy the king who is in the Valley of Aven and the one who holds the scepter in Beth Eden. The people of Aram will go into exile to Kir,” says the Lord. (Amos 1:3-5)

The Lord had Amos begin with a series of pronouncements upon Israel’s traditional enemies that will take us through chapter 1 and into chapter 2, when He will inform Israel that they will not escape His anger.

Damascus was the capital of Aram. The Arameans had brutally mistreated the people of Gilead, Israel’s territory east of the Sea of Galilee. A number of years earlier the Lord had sent Elijah to anoint Hazael king over Aram (1 Kings 19:15). Ben-Hadad was his son and successor. Aven can mean wickedness or emptiness and Eden means pleasure or delight. These are most likely references to Damascus. The Lord is promising to destroy the king who rules from there and send the people into exile. This prophecy was fulfilled in 732 BC by the Assyrians. (Note: Damascus was not destroyed at the time so this cannot be seen as a fulfillment of Isaiah 17:1.)
This is what the Lord says:
“For three sins of Gaza, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath. Because she took captive whole communities and sold them to Edom, I will send fire upon the walls of Gaza that will consume her fortresses. I will destroy the king of Ashdod and the one who holds the scepter in Ashkelon. I will turn my hand against Ekron, till the last of the Philistines is dead,” says the Sovereign Lord. (Amos 1:6-9)

Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Ekron were four of the five major cities of the Philistines. The fifth one was Gath, where Goliath had lived, and had already been conquered. The Land of Edom is in southern Jordan today. The Philistines had apparently overrun entire villages on the trade route between Gaza and Edom and sold the inhabitants to the Edomites as if they were livestock. The Philistines were finally wiped out to the last person by the Babylonians in 604 BC.
This is what the Lord says:
“For three sins of Tyre, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath. Because she sold whole communities of captives to Edom, disregarding a treaty of brotherhood, I will send fire upon the walls of Tyre that will consume her fortresses” (Amos 1:7-10)

Tyre, a Phoenician city that still exists in modern Lebanon, was also engaged in the wholesale trade of Jewish captives. Tyre had enjoyed friendly relations with Israel since the days of David, and when Solomon began construction on the Temple he made a treaty with Hiram, the King of Tyre, to provide wheat and olive oil in exchange for the famous cedars of Lebanon. This friendship ended when Hiram’s grandson became king and began his slave trading enterprise.

Tyre was a city built partly on the mainland and partly on an island off shore. In Ezekiel 26:3 the Lord promised to bring many nations against Tyre, like the sea casting its waves. Assyria had been the first, but it was Nebuchadnezzar who demolished the mainland portion of Tyre during a 15 year seige (586-571 BC). Alexander the Great completed the conquest of Tyre by using the ruins of the mainland portion to build a causeway to the remaining island fortress and destroying it in 332 BC.

Much of modern Lebanon was originally part of the Promised Land. In the Millennium it will once again belong to Israel.
This is what the Lord says:
“For three sins of Edom, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath. Because he pursued his brother with a sword, stifling all compassion, because his anger raged continually and his fury flamed unchecked, I will send fire upon Teman that will consume the fortresses of Bozrah” (Amos 1:11-12).
 
Edom was another name for Esau, the brother of Jacob. The strife created by Jacob’s trickery in stealing Esau’s birthright festered through the generations. Finally King David subdued the Edomites and after that Edom was under Israel’s control, although not happily.

When the Edomites heard of Nebuchednezzar’s intention to conquer Judah, they colluded with the Babylonians to help make Judah’s defeat certain and made plans to steal their land. God was not pleased by this and promised to make Edom a desolate waste (Ezekiel 35:1-15). After defeating Judah the Babylonians turned on the Edomites and slaughtered them. Teman and Bosrah were major cities of Edom, near Petra in today’s southern Jordan. In Jeremiah 49:18 God swore that Edom would be overthrown like Sodom and Gomorrah were overthrown and no one will live there.
This is what the Lord says:
“For three sins of Ammon, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath. Because he ripped open the pregnant women of Gilead in order to extend his borders, I will set fire to the walls of Rabbah that will consume her fortresses amid war cries on the day of battle, amid violent winds on a stormy day. Her king will go into exile, he and his officials together,” says the Lord (Amos 1:13-15).

Ammon’s greed for land led to a program of genocide against the Gideonites. Rabbah was the name for the city now known as Ahman, the capital of Jordan. This prophecy was fulfilled by the Assyrians, but did not result in the disappearance of the Ammonites. Later, like their cousins the Moabites, the Ammonites assisted in Nebuchadnezzar’s conquest of Judah, for which the Lord promised to exterminate them (Ezekiel 25:7). But in Jeremiah 49:6 He said the Ammonites will be restored in the latter days.

Amos 2

This is what the Lord says:
“For three sins of Moab, even for four, I will not turn back my wrath. Because he burned, as if to lime, the bones of Edom’s king, I will send fire upon Moab that will consume the fortresses of Kerioth. Moab will go down in great tumult amid war cries and the blast of the trumpet. I will destroy her ruler and kill all her officials with him,” says the Lord (Amos 2:1-3).

There are two possibilities here. This passage apparently refers to the only time when Edom and Moab were not on the same side against Israel. 2 Kings 3:9 says the kings of Judah, Israel, and Edom were united against the king of Moab who had refused to pay the tribute he owed to the King of Israel. 

When it became obvious that he was losing the ensuing battle, the King of Moab became so enraged that he took 700 swordsmen and went after the King of Edom. Failing to capture him, the King of Moab either captured the King of Edom’s son and heir to the throne and offered him as a burnt offering to his god, or else he dug up the remains of a past king of Edom and burned them instead. Either way it was a great offense against the Lord and the Moabites were utterly defeated. 

Later they were taken captive by the Babylonians and soon disappeared from the world scene. But Jeremiah 48:47 tells us the fortunes of Moab will also be restored in the latter days.
Along with Edom and Ammon, Moab has reappeared as the kingdom of Jordan, the only nation in the Middle East that will escape the clutches of the anti-Christ in the end times (Daniel 11:41).

A Reasonable Faith

It was learning about the unfailing fulfillment of prophecies like these that brought me to the foot of the cross. I reasoned that a God who could predict and then perform like this has to be who He claims to be, and it was safe to put my trust in Him.
In Isaiah 46:9-10 He said, “Remember the former things, those of long ago; I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me. I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come.”

And from Isaiah 48:3,6, “I foretold the former things long ago,my mouth announced them and I made them known; then suddenly I acted, and they came to pass. You have heard these things; look at them all. Will you not admit them?

Later I would learn that no other so-called holy book offers this kind of proof. And if so many prophecies He foretold about our past have come to pass, doesn’t it make sense that those He foretold about our future will come to pass as well? Think about it.

From our study of Psalm 83 you can recognize several familiar names. But remember, the prophecies of Amos 1 were fulfilled at various times over a period of 400 years, not in a single battle. Therefore we can’t see them as a fulfillment of Psalm 83. Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel also prophesied the conquest of these next door enemies of Israel, but none of their prophecies match with Psalm 83 either. Damascus was not destroyed as Isaiah 17 requires, and both Jeremiah and Daniel speak of the re-emergence of Edom, Moab and Ammon in the last days. Clearly the Battle of Psalm 83 is yet to come.

Next time we’ll begin looking at what the Lord had Amos say to Israel, and it won’t be pretty. See you then. 02-16-13

The Story Behind The Redeemer

This Week’s Feature Article by Jack Kelley
Reblogged from gracethrufaith.com 
As many of you already know, my newest book, The Redeemer, became available this week. Since it’s a little different from my previous efforts I want to give you some background on why I wrote it.

Why Did You Do That?

The current trend among ministries like ours is to tap into all the different social networking media in an effort to broaden their audiences. And while we’ve begun to do that as well, we’ve also been taking a look at what the world would be like if suddenly there were no internet ministries.

There are three reasons why I think it makes sense for someone in my position to consider this. First, of course, is the rapture of the Church. Without Christians around to maintain them, Christian websites would soon disappear too. And try as I might, I just can’t imagine asking one of my non-believing friends to take over in my absence if I should suddenly disappear, although that could certainly be the spark to ignite a conversation of a different sort. The problem is if the conversation resulted in the friend’s conversion I’d be right back in the same situation. I’d have to find someone who is not a believer now, but was guaranteed to become one right after the rapture. So far the Lord hasn’t revealed such a person to me.

The second reason is an EMP (electromagnetic pulse) attack. A nuclear warhead detonated in the atmosphere above the US would send an electromagnetic pulse hurtling to Earth at the speed of light. Depending on the height, the location, and the power of the explosion it could destroy all computers and other electronic devices in the US instantly. No more internet. No more electronics of any kind. Experts say this is where we are most vulnerable to terrorists because the capability already exists, it’s a relatively inexpensive weapon, and we have no defense against it.

The third reason is something that’s also in the works. The UN is persisting in their effort to gain control of and regulate the internet. One of their stated goals is to eliminate hate speech, but as we know in some people’s view hate speech includes Biblical Christianity. This is partly due to the fact that we’re opposed to homosexuality and abortion, and believe that non-believers will be condemned. If the UN gets the power it wants, Bible study websites like ours could soon be censored to the point of ineffectiveness.

For these reasons, I concluded that we should also pay attention to some of the more traditional means of mass communications, and that includes writing books. Books are more durable. Once they’re in circulation no one can push a button somewhere and erase them.  In short they’re better suited to times of political uncertainty.

What’s It All About?

So then the question became what to write about.  My experience answering Biblical questions over the past five years has taught me that a lot of Christians really don’t know very much about our faith. At some point in their lives they chose to become believers, but because there are so few opportunities for meaningful discipleship, they frequently just go on living as they had before. If someone asks them to explain their faith, they have a hard time doing so because what little knowledge they have is largely hearsay. And as for having a meaningful discussion with a curious non-believer, forget about it.

The majority of today’s believers are represented by the seed that fell among thorns in Matt. 13:7, which is part of the Kingdom Parables. Jesus described them as being unfruitful because they are too concerned about the things of this world (Matt. 13:22). According to recent surveys over 90% of people who call themselves Christians fall into this category. Now I’m not questioning their salvation. I’m talking about their fruitfulness. Salvation is not a fruit bearing event. It’s what we do after we’re saved that determines our fruitfulness.

An apple tree is born because the seed that was planted in the ground has germinated and produced a new life. It grows to maturity and begins to produce apples. Although the tree was alive from the moment it sprang forth from the soil it wasn’t considered to be fruitful until it produced more of its own kind. After all, apples aren’t just for eating. They’re also for producing more apple trees.

So it is with believers. We’re born again because the seed of the gospel was planted in our heart. But although we’re a new creation from the moment we believe we’re not considered to be fruitful until we produce more of our own kind. We’re not just for singing and praising God. We’re also for producing more Christians (Matt. 28:19-20)
From this I determined that three groups of people could benefit from knowing more about what Christians believe and why we believe it. In no particular order, they are curious unbelievers, new believers, and long time believers who want to become more fruitful.

After some prayer and reflection on this, I felt like the Lord had told me what to write about and who to write it to. I divided the message into eight parts, which became the book’s eight chapters. Eight is the number of new beginnings and it’s my prayer that many who read the book will be motivated to begin their life anew, whether by deciding to become a believer, or by having their faith strengthened through a deeper understanding of what the Lord has done for them.

Chapter 1. The Redeemer Is Promised

The book begins at the beginning, explaining how mankind became estranged from God and why we need a redeemer to bring us back to Him.

Chapter 2. The Redeemer Awaits

Chapter two is an overview of what God was doing between the time He promised to send a redeemer and the time of His actual arrival. Think of it as a very brief summary of the Old Testament as it concerns man’s redemption.

Chapter 3. The Redeemer Is Given

This is the Christmas story. To show that the Redeemer is the focus of the entire Bible I made liberal use of Old Testament prophecies that foretold of His coming.

Chapter 4. The Redeemer In Ministry

This chapter is devoted to a summary of things Jesus taught us about what He had come to do and why it was important for to us understand that He wasn’t starting a new religion. On the contrary, He was trying to re-establish a relationship.

Chapter 5. The Redeemer In Victory

This is the longest chapter in the book and gives a day-by-day description of His official presentation as the Redeemer, His final days of teaching, His crucifixion, and His resurrection, eight days that changed everything between God and man.

Chapter 6. The Redeemer In The Church

Following His ascension, the men He had trained and mentored began to build His Church. This chapter shows how the Church began, why and when the New Testament was written and what effect the Redeemer has had in the world. It ends with a prayer that allows those who began reading out of curiosity to become children of God.

Chapter 7. The Redeemer In Prophecy

Jesus didn’t die for us just so our sins could be forgiven. He died so whoever believes in Him can have eternal life. Chapter 7 explains why Christians have a right to believe there’s a future in store for us that exceeds our wildest expectations.

Chapter 8. The Redeemer Returns

We conclude with a summary of end times events that will take place after the rapture. It shows how God will fulfill the promise he made so long ago to reverse the devastating effects of sin and restore planet Earth to its origial condition.

In Summary

I wrote the book in simple straight forward language so even people who are not believers could see the importance of changing their lives and becoming born again. I included hundreds of Bible references within the text so new believers could use the book as a study guide to help them understand what our faith is all about. After a few hours of diligent study with nothing but this book in one hand and and a Bible in the other, a new believer can come away with a greater understanding of our faith than most seasoned veterans have. These references will also help long time believers search the Scriptures to prove whether what I’ve written is true in accordance with Acts 17:11, and rekindle the flame of faith they had at the beginning.

As I did with my last book, I’ve included an appendix with eight of our most popular studies on prophecy, eternal security, and faith.  These will facilitate continued growth and understanding.

All that said, I think The Redeemer will accomplish its stated goals in the life of anyone who reads it with a sincere desire to learn. I also think it will make an ideal gift for a person who has expressed interest in our faith, whether as a prelude to a personal discussion or to supplement one you’ve already begun.

Of course, you’d expect me to say something like that. After all, I wrote the book. The best way to see if I’m right is to get a copy and read it for yourself. Selah 01-26-13